Pagoda

It would be insane and about a 0.1% chance of happening. Entertaining though. He fully jumped the shark today.

We’ve got a shot at an him I suspect.

Perhaps, you could be right. He would have got better players here, so a bit hard to know…

I know some IU media folks so I know what these two think on Stevens specifically. But as I always say, I so want them to be wrong.

Not how I read it. These guys don’t believe the Stevens rumors. But I so want BTB posters to be right.

#1 is more or less Purdue. They may have a little more than 50% of our NIL, 2/3 at most though. And yea maybe Matt isn’t top 2 or 3, but he is up there. I’d take #1 and pray a great coach can get players at a discount.

This article is Niziolek and Osterman.

IndyStar poo poo’d the rumors in their article this morning (Niziolek and Osterman), they wrote, “The overwhelming majority of noise and fury filtering through the IU basketball ecosystem right now is, to use an industry term, crap.” That said, I am hoping the BTB posters claiming to be in the know are right…

Whoever our new coach is should look into these kids… notably the top one…

Haralson should check out whoever our new coach is and see if he likes him…

I can’t help but really enjoy following these Brad predictions. I don’t think we get him, but seeing if these predictions come true is pretty interesting. In would love for the people who cover IU to get a whiff of these rumors. They wouldn’t write about it, but I’d like them to just hear it.

It’s a discussion on who is making this hire, not exactly about firing Mike. Seems close enough for this thread.

I love to hear that as much as possible. I have confidence in him too.

I get what you’re saying. You may be right and it’s fair to have concerns the meddling won’t stop. I can’t look at the last 25 years and be super confident lol. The Woody firing was a bit alarming for sure. Scott and Pam need to step up, hopefully with some self aware trustees/donors. So far it sounds like Scott is in charge, but it’s possible the meddlers may try to step in again (cringe). If that happens we are in deep sh1t. Of course there is also risk Scott hires the wrong person on his own. Perilous times!

I’m not sure on the specifics. I only know Quinn was pushing for Mike as far back as 2017. Exactly what was agreed to I don’t know.

I really hope our org chart is fixed with Quinn on the way out and he and his pals also discredited. No more meddling. Scott makes the athletics calls, of course Pam works with Scott, but she also has to provide cover for him when trustees and donors can’t helped themselves and start yapping. She has to tell them to F off. Hopefully the next BoT Chair understands how this should work and contributes to everything running like a proper organization. We really want to Scott in charge of the whole athletic dept. That way if results are good or bad, it’s clear who is responsible and we can change out Scott if he doesn’t meet the goals he agrees to with Pam and the Board. Management 101. We had serious upper level meddling with the AD’s job in 2001, 2006, 2021, and 2024. It has killed our bball program, the meddlers are either clueless on how to hire/fire coaches or they’re outrageously conflicted.

I don't think that's quite how this is playing out. - First off, I don't get the frustration with Scott. Last year he was the only person at IU that wanted to move on from Woody. The BoT, the key donors, and Pam didn't want to move on. Scott was the one guy at IU on our side, he would have fit in well in the Fire Mike Woodson thread. - If we miss on Dusty, it's going to be blamed on Quinn and Ferguson. There is a whole IndyStar article, among other reports, detailing how those two protected Woody last year. That will be referenced. And everyone knows Quinn effectively hired Woody to begin with. - The BoT controls approvals for big hires like a new coach. In reality, Scott can't just do whatever he wants because he is Woody's boss. And it sucks, but Scott also has to factor in when our biggest donor likes Woody, we need those many millions of dollars for the athletic dept and to be a bball NIL powerhouse into the future. - Maybe there is room for criticism on how Woody is being let go. I don't know. While the letter is annoying, Woody still has a lot of powerful friends at IU, and Scott still managed to shitcan him midseason. Things behind the scenes are very political and Scott will need people onside for the next hire, so maybe consider Scott has to work that bigger picture angle. Plus of course Woody is a total @$$ to deal with which makes this separation 100x harder. - I doubt this next bball hire makes or breaks Scott's job. His job rides on football, which is 3x+ bigger than bball and drives basically the entire athletic dept. If football does well, Scott probably survives a bad bball hire. The tens of millions of extra dollars Scott is bringing in from football is what IU really notices and cares about. If football declines, a good bball hire may not save Scott. But let's hope it doesn't come down to this... - The next bball hire is all Scott as far as I'm concerned. Scott is the guy to blame good or bad. He seems to be leading this process thanks to the political capital and influence from building up football, plus it helps Quinn and the donors were proven to be 100% wrong on Woody and clearly incompetent. Scott isn't perfect, but I defend him on here because big picture he has done some very good things while having to work with a lot of difficult people at IU. And when I look around IU and the athletic dept, when it comes to making hires, he is quite literally all we've got. Hopefully he gets this bball hire right. And of course, it is a free country, so if anyone wants to dislike Scott, that's up to you. This is just how I look at it.

True. And the mismanagement, negligence, and poor decisions really go back to 2000. I will spare the forum a list of those transgressions. After a quarter century of this nonsense from IU, it's amazing we have any fans left.

I feel the same. If this hire is a flop I’m happy to just focus on football like I have for over a year now. We have real coaches and leaders there worth supporting, plus it’s by far the biggest college sport as we know. Soccer, baseball, WBB are cool too.

Do we need him to start losing to give ourselves a better chance to get him? I’m sort of kidding… It’s soul crushing knowing he was ours for the taking last year.

As many know UK made a huge run at Drew before they went to Hurley and then Pope. IIRC Mitch Barnhart had a good, long-term relationship with Scott, so UK had an angle to get him. Drew’s family even flew to Lexington to check it out. As we know they passed. The reason is likely what OKHOOSIER stated — Drew and his family are extremely tied into the religious aspects of Baylor. We aren’t UK, but zoom out and IU is pretty similar, we just happen to be in a college town and have our teeth. I doubt he leaves Baylor for us for the same reasons he didn’t leave for UK. I don’t see a unique angle for us to get him.

Dolson has initiated the Cronin PSYOP.

100%. And not only are the fans not the problem, they are our biggest asset and one of the only "elite" or "blueblood" things we have left. We are still a top-5 or 10 program in revenue and valuation, which is all down the fans somehow spending money on our crap teams. And then there is NIL, which is very important, and that comes from... fans. With NIL we have two notable fans that give a lot, but there is an exceptional amount of giving from a lot of people. And you're also right that the admin and who they hire are responsible for the bad results.

Message board rumors and conjecture don't have anything to do with the success of the program. We get it, you don't like IU fans and believe the fans are the problem narrative. This is a pretty common view for the burners and the current staff.

Same. I think his Year 1 success gets the attention of the big money folks at UM and he gets a contract/staff budget/NIL boost and he elects to keep building there. UM is a good school and lower pressure gig. All we can offer is perhaps a little more money and easier transfers, but we are also a tire fire. Not hiring him after last season was likely a huge mistake and just classic IUBB mismanagement. If we did hire him we would be in fantastic shape right now on the court and recruiting. On the other hand, maybe he loves IU and is confident Scott and Pam have cleared out the old guard so he feels good enough to jump into the tire fire and fix it. Fingers crossed.